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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28729266">Protecting Jim</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458'>Bluewolf458</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Sentinel (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Sentinel Thursday</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 12:13:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,174</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28729266</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After the police academy Blair chooses to work with Patrol for a few weeks</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>2021 Sentinel Thursday Recycled Challenges</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Protecting Jim</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for the recycled prompt 'break'</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Protecting Jim</p><p>by Bluewolf</p><p>Although Simon had told him that all he needed to do was take firearms training (which he actually didn't need - he was perfectly capable of handling a gun, he just preferred not to) to let him join Major Crime, after he attended the Police Academy Blair chose to spend several weeks on Patrol.</p><p>Nobody would have faulted him if he had just walked into a detective slot - his years as an observer/consultant left him knowing just about everything he needed to know about police work. In addition, he was known by pretty well everyone in the PD; and it was common knowledge he had provided tutoring for the teenage children of some of the PD personnel and hadn't charged them anything for doing it. But they all respected him for his decision to get some hands-on experience of the work the patrol officers did.</p><p>He was assigned to work with Todd Harcott, an officer with nearly thirty years of service and no plans to retire for a few more years. Todd loved the work, the challenge of getting the people who broke the law off the street.</p><p>The job he most enjoyed, however, was operating a speed trap camera.</p><p>Until he was partnered with Todd, Blair - who always drove carefully - had had no idea how many people were more than ready to break the speed limit.</p><p>Certainly he had always bought cheap elderly cars that he referred to as classics - cars that were more than likely to break down if he pushed their speed beyond, possibly, 25 mph. But the first day he had joined Todd behind a speed camera had been an absolute eye-opener.</p><p>At least half of the cars that passed them were exceeding the speed limit.</p><p>"This is a fairly law-abiding day," Todd murmured.</p><p>"It is?"</p><p>"There are days when nobody seems to obey the limit," Todd said. "We usually ignore the ones breaking the limit by up to about four miles an hour; if we didn't, in the course of a month pretty well everyone in Cascade would be fined or banned for speeding. But if they break the limit by five miles an hour or more, we jump on them."</p><p>Blair nodded. "It can be very easy to go over the limit," he said. "You're keeping pace with the speed the traffic is moving, and don't realize how fast you're going."</p><p>"And that's the difference between a good driver and a careless one. A careless one could actually be very good on, say, a race track - but on a city street? He takes chances. A really good driver keeps an eye on his speed as well as the road."</p><p>Blair grinned. "Well, you're unlikely ever to catch me speeding... unless Jim persuades me to get a better - aka more modern - car than the ones I've been driving for the last ten years. My present one isn't quite as bad as my last one, but it... I was lucky to maintain 25 mph with it."</p><p>Todd's lips twitched. "Now you're a cop, you'll need something that goes faster than that," he said.</p><p>"I know," Blair said. "Jim suggested impound as a possible source, but even that is dearer than I can afford for the moment. Yes, I got a settlement from Berkshire Publishing, but I'd student loans to pay off, and that took most of the settlement."</p><p>"Just what was the situation with Berkshire?" Todd asked.</p><p>Blair sighed. "I was writing a dissertation for my PhD. But at the same time I was writing a fictional dissertation for my own amusement - something to fill in time when I was on surveillance with Jim, though I did do some work on it at home.</p><p>"My mother arrived for a visit just as I finished the fictional one; she thought it was the real diss and sent it to Berkshire, to an editor friend there to edit it for me. If that was all he had done, I could have used his edits - or at least some of them - to second-draft it, this time with possible publication in mind. But he thought it really was the PhD dissertation, wouldn't listen when I said it wasn't for publication... If it really had been the dissertation, I wouldn't have been able to present it if it had already been published, but he wouldn't listen to anything I said, and I still don't understand why he was so anxious to publish it anyway - something written in the form of a dissertation isn't really terribly interesting reading; it's very dry."</p><p>"And that was why you said it was fraudulent?" Todd asked.</p><p>"Quickest way to kill the story.</p><p>"Anyway, we got hold of a good lawyer and he put a stop to everything and got me a nice settlement from Berkshire. But the chancellor at Rainier didn't like me and jumped at what she saw was the perfect opportunity to get rid of me - without giving me the chance to submit the proper diss.</p><p>"I'd done a diss on historical sentinels for my Masters, and when I was wondering about a subject for the PhD I discussed with my adviser the possibility of expanding the sentinel one for it, so she did have some excuse for thinking I had done that. But I decided that I didn't have the material to do more than just rewrite the original one. So I made the subject of my PhD diss the work of the police. My lawyer is still arguing that out with Rainier. I'd like to get the PhD, but if I do get it, I won't go back to academia. I'm totally committed now to working with the police."</p><p>"So the story that Ellison has heightened senses... ?"</p><p>"Is a story. He does have excellent sight and hearing, which is really why I used his name in the fictional 'diss', but that was also really to help me concentrate on what I was writing. Even if I had considered the thing as a PhD diss, I'd have had to go through it and remove his name before presenting it." Blair sighed. In many ways he was sorry to perpetuate the myth that Jim wasn't a sentinel, but it was undeniably certain that it was safer for Jim if he did.</p><p>Meanwhile, he turned his attention back to the road, in time to register yet another vehicle passing them going far, far too quickly. "And what you do here... is of far more value to society than anything I might have done in academia."</p><p>"Though it's depressing to realize just how few drivers take being caught once as the lesson it should be," Todd muttered. "There are some who haven't had the time to pay one fine before they're caught speeding again."</p><p>Blair chuckled. "You know, Todd... Just because I'm working now with the police, doesn't mean I can't still submit articles to anthropology magazines... I'll have to do some research, but you've just given me an idea for an article! 'Speeding throughout history...'."</p>
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